


Extreme Brevity

by stardust_and_sunlight



Series: Flash Fiction February [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F, Flash Fiction, M/M, and also most of them are gay, because i am very predictable, flash fiction february, there are cute ones and sad one and funny ones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-11-02 22:04:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 28
Words: 9,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10953627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardust_and_sunlight/pseuds/stardust_and_sunlight
Summary: The twenty-eight tiny short stories I wrote for Flash Fiction February 2017, all in one place.





	1. Day 1: light

**Author's Note:**

> So. At my uni there's a Creative Writing Society (of which I am the Vice President yas), and every year we do this thing called Flash Fiction February. Basically, we upload prompts every day and all the society try and write as many tiny short stories as possible. This year I wrote one for every day (not necessarily on the right day but I wrote them all at some point) and I was SO PROUD and they were all posted on our blog but I thought I'd post them here as well!  
> I am aware that it's no longer February, but I finished my last one in mid March and I have been incredibly busy with deadlines and exams and things. Fun!  
> Some of them are cute, some of them are ridiculous, some of them are funny. Some of them I want to expand into bigger stories, so probably look out for that in future fics!  
> (The title is from the Wikipedia article on Flash Fiction, because I'm terrible at thinking of titles.)

The brightness filled her eyes, filled her mind, filled her entire being, until she felt full of light, full of a happiness that she’d never felt before. And then it was gone, and she fell to her knees, gasping, from its sudden absence.

“This is what you could have, if you came with us,” the voice said, warm and welcoming, cajoling, promising more light, more happiness, more joy.

“No,” she said, and her lip trembled.

“Very well,” the voice said, and the tone had changed, becoming cold and sharp and brittle. “Then enjoy the dark.”

And the darkness flooded in, pitch black and freezing and terrifying, and she screamed.


	2. Day 2: lake

The surface of the water was still. There were no ripples, nothing disturbing the calm, the peace. There was an eerie silence in the air, a strange sense of fear, of apprehension. Of _waiting._

The sky is grey and the water is grey. The weather never changes over this lake- there is the perpetual silence, the calm before the storm, the gritty closeness when all you need is thunder. Even the trees have faded, faded into the background.

Nothing new has happened here for centuries. No-one knew has arrived. But still, one man sits.

Time has worn him away, and he is as grey as the trees, grey as the lake, grey as the sky. He sits in the oppressive quiet. He, too, is waiting.

Nothing changes. Nothing has changed. But here he will wait.

Until the rain comes. Until Arthur returns.


	3. Day 3: dance, storm

She dances in the rain. The cold of it soaks through her dress, chilling her skin, drenching her hair. The rivulets of it run down her face like tears, but she isn’t crying, not now. Not in this moment, as the thunder cracks and the lightning strikes and the rain pours and pours and pours.

She dances in the rain, leaping in time with booms of thunder, pirouetting in time with flashes of lightning, using the bounce of the raindrops on the pavement as her beat. Her steps are light and she soars along, her heart full of happiness.

She dances in the rain, her face tilted up to the storm. She laughs delightedly.


	4. Day 4: shoelaces, smog

She tied her keys into her shoelaces, just as she did every morning. Her mother yelled at her for sleeping in, just as she did every morning. She had two slices of toast with blackcurrant jam, just as she did every morning. She left the house at 8.25am, just as she did every morning. And she walked to work. Just as she did every morning.

It was a cold, damp day. There was a dense fog over everything, turning the distant buildings into ghostly shadows. People plodded along, heads down, eyes on the pavement. Everyone was grey. Everything was grey.

 She walked slowly, every step heavy and deliberate, in no hurry to arrive. The cold chilled her to the bone and she hugged her jacket tighter around her. The wind sent tiny daggers into her exposed skin, and she shivered, regretting not bringing a scarf.

It was just another day, the same as every other. She could never have expected what came next.


	5. Day 5: cigarette

“Fucking stupid piece of shit lighter,” she snapped, words mangled slightly around the cigarette clamped between her lips, cupping her hand awkwardly around the end of it, clicking the lighter fruitlessly. Her movements were clearly inexpert, and I couldn’t help my laugh.

“Give me that, you idiot,” I said, taking both the lighter and the cigarette from her and lighting it easily, allowing myself one pull only before pocketing the lighter and handing her the lit cigarette. “Can I ask why? You don’t smoke. I know this because you’ve often gave me long lectures about the health risks, even though other than a few sneaky ones on a stressful day I haven’t properly smoked in years.”

She took the cigarette from me carefully and gingerly, as if holding a bomb. “Because two women standing outside a random house is suspicious and shady, but two women standing outside a random house passing a cigarette between them are just out for a smoke,” she said primly, and I smiled, impressed despite myself.

“Smart,” I said, grudgingly, and she grinned smugly, taking a too-deep drag on the cigarette and choking, her cough loud in the empty street. I chuckled, and she glowered at me. “You’ll draw more attention doing it wrong,” I said, and she sighed, clearly unwilling to admit I was right. “Let me show you how? Watch me,” I said, as I plucked the cigarette from her hand, and, exaggerating my movements, took a careful drag. I blew out the smoke, and suppressed a shiver at her eyes watching me so intently, watching my _lips_. I took another puff and gave it back. “Now you try,” I said, and she did.

I stared at her, glad that the dim light hid my blush. She blew out, with only a tiny cough, and I smiled proudly. “You’re a natural,” I said, and she grimaced.

“I don’t like the taste,” she said, and I laughed.

“You’ll get used to it,” I said, tilting my head back, squinting through the smoke.

“I hope I don’t,” she said, and I didn’t argue.

We stood there, trading the cigarette back and forth, and the atmosphere was strange, tense, hot. Every time our fingers touched I felt a spark, no matter how cliché that sounded. And I knew that wasn’t just the lit end of the cigarette. I couldn’t drag my eyes away from her lips, her throat, her eyes. Her dark skin glowed in the yellow streetlamps. She was beautiful.

“There he is,” she said suddenly, breaking the silence, her voice hoarse. I glanced across the road to see our mark, finally leaving his house.

I squinted down at my watch. “He’s early,” I murmured, and then extinguished the cigarette. “You ready?” I asked, but she stiffened.

“He saw us,” she said, tight and scared, and my brain worked lightning fast.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, and then I kissed her, my arms wrapping around her, her hands touching my back gently, her touch growing firmer, the kiss deepening. And then I remembered where I was, and I broke away, breathing heavily.

“Why were you sorry?” she said, her face very close to mine, and I knew we had a job to do, and I could see our mark, out the corner of my eye, wandering away, but all I could think about was her.

“I wanted the first time to be for real,” I said faintly, unable to pull together the brain cells to lie, and her eyes went soft.

“The second time can be for real,” she said, and it sounded like a promise.

I nodded, a smile growing across my face, and she shook her head fondly, reaching into her jacket and pulling out her gun.

“Shall we?” she said wickedly, and I nodded again, following her down the street.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My flatmate read this one for me because I wasn't sure of the flow, and their comment at the bottom was just "ARE THEY SPIES TELL ME" which made me laugh.


	6. Day 6: necklace

“It’s a cursed necklace.”

“It is _not_ a cursed necklace,” I sighed, snatching the box away from her. “It’s just a normal old necklace in a normal old box, stop tampering with the fucking evidence.”

She stuck her tongue out at me and I raised an eyebrow. “Real mature,” I snipped, and she pointedly turned her back on me, returning to cataloguing and bagging the piles of junk in this musty old room.

I had unearthed a mouldy old-fashioned fan, three dusty fake flower bouquets and what looked disturbingly like a mouse skeleton before she spoke again.

“I’m telling you,” she said, poking me in the ribs, “something in here has to be cursed.”

I groaned, exasperated. “Can I be there when you tell the Captain that you think the old lady was _cursed?_ I’m sure he’s gonna love it.”

“I’m not saying that she was killed by a cursed object,” she said, as if it was obvious. “I’m just saying that in all these piles of junk, chances are something is cursed. And it’s usually a necklace.”

I held up the music box I’d just uncovered. “You’re sure it’s not the music box that’s cursed? You know, you open it, the music plays, everything falls into a deep sleep that no-one ever wakes from…”

She grinned. “I know you’re mocking me, but the day really will go quicker if we find cursed things and not just rotted food.”

I laughed. “First one to find a human skull wins?”

“Loser buys the drinks?”

“You’re on.”


	7. Day 7: socks

Sophie opened her eyes, and immediately regretted it. Her mouth was unpleasantly dry and her head was pounding and her muscles were aching and, yep, she was naked in a stranger’s bed. Yay. She moved tentatively and groaned. Fuck. She was curled up under the covers, head just poking out, and the sun was pouring in through the window, through a crack in the curtain, right onto her face.

She looked around the room, but it remained unfamiliar. Who had she met? The room was large and cluttered, but the windows were big, with pretty yellow curtains. There were textbooks and notebooks piled on a messy desk, clothes draped over a chair… and then she noticed something, and swore softly under her breath.

A cloak hung over a hook on the back of the door. A workbench with shelves of bottles and vials. Spell books and star charts. An old-fashioned broom in the corner.

“Fuck,” she muttered, “did I sleep with a _witch_?”

There was a laugh, and she bolted upright, grimacing as the movement hurt her head. A girl had walked into the room and was grinning at her. She was wearing a giant t-shirt and fluffy socks, and Sophie was aware that she was beautiful, even through her fuzzy hungover haze.

“You did,” the girl said, sitting down on the bed next to Sophie, “and I slept with a very unobservant vampire.”

Sophie cursed again, flopping back down onto her stomach and burying her face in the pillows. “Fuck,” she said, the word muffled by the fabric.

The girl laughed again. It was lovely. _Fuck._

“I’ve never seen a vampire that drunk before,” the girl said. “I didn’t know vampires could even _get_ that drunk.”

“We can get drunk,” Sophie said grudgingly, rolling over to look at the girl. She was still annoyingly beautiful, even with ruffled hair and smudged make-up. “We just need to drink a _lot._ It was my friend’s birthday and he was buying and I’d had a shit day and I shouldn’t be telling you this really, I can’t believe I slept with a _witch._ Why were you even at a vamp club?”

“I wasn’t at a vamp club,” the other girl said, smirking, “you were at a witch club.”

“Oh,” Sophie said weakly, remembering with a sudden flash. “So I was.”

She lay there, staring at a strange shaped stain on the ceiling, piecing through her memories of last night and blushing.

The other girl cleared her throat, and Sophie was pulled from her thoughts with a jolt.

“Feel free to say no, if you aren’t up for it or just want to run away, but… do you want to go for breakfast or something?” the witch said abruptly, and even in her unobservant state Sophie could see a hint of nervousness.

Sophie considered it. “Yes,” she said finally, surprising even herself, and the girl beamed, bright and relieved and happy.

“What’s your name?” she asked apologetically, “if you told me last night I don’t remember, sorry…”

Sophie grinned. “I’m Sophie,” she said, and the girl raised her eyebrow.

“A vampire called Sophie?”

“Hey!” Sophie said indignantly. “That is a perfectly normal vamp name. What’s your name?”

“My name’s Rowena,” she said, grinning.

“You’re kidding me,” Sophie said flatly, and the girl laughed, shaking her head.

“Of course I’m kidding,” she said, and Sophie glared at her. “It’s Anna,” she corrected.

And Sophie smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one of my favourites, and you'll definitely see it again as a fic one day!


	8. Day 8: jagged

She smiles. It’s lovely, beautiful, gorgeous. I could list adjectives for all letters of the alphabet to describe that oh-so-simple muscle movement. But it’s not even just her lips. She smiles with her whole  _face._  Her eyes light up and her cheeks dimple and her forehead scrunches and I swear it makes you smile just to see it.

It’s always the highlight of my day, getting her to smile, getting her to laugh. She likes terrible puns and bad innuendos and even more than those, she likes videos of cats pushing things off of tables.  I love finding things that I know will make her laugh. Her laugh is infectious, leaving you beaming just to hear it.

She’s so easy with her smiles and her laughs, and when I’m the one that causes that outburst of happiness, it fills me with this strange sense of  _pride_. I did that, I made her happy. And that makes  _me_  happy. Because all I want is for her to be happy.

And that’s how I knew something was wrong. One day I made a dreadful pun and she laughed but it  _wasn’t real._  Her eyes didn’t light up. Her face was tense. And her smile was just so sad, so forced, so  _jagged._  And what could I do to help?


	9. Day 9: minute

“Listen. I know that you’re scared, and that’s okay. I’m not gonna tell you it’ll be alright, because chances are it won’t be, and I don’t want to have to break that promise. It might be terrible- in fact, it definitely will be. It’s all gonna go wrong. It  _never_  goes to plan. But if anyone can get through it, it’s you. You’re the strongest person I know. Good luck. I’ll see you soon.”

“How are you? You ready? Got your gear together? Good, good, we won’t have time to sort it when we get there. It’s gonna be fast, I want the teams moving on my mark –no, I don’t know where your clipboard is, get it together, man- so you’ve gotta be ready. Go find your team, they should be over there. Oh, and tell your supervisor to come have a word with me!”

“I’m not going to have a chance to see you until later, probably, so I just wanted to say… you’re the best friend I ever had, and I’m sure we’ll be fine but. Well. If something does happen, I’d be pissed at myself if I didn’t say anything. I love you. And I’m so glad you’re in my life- ah shit, they’re calling me. Meet you at the usual place afterwards, okay?”

“You’ll be fine, you’re the best in our fucking class- except for that one time I beat you in maths, hah…”

“On my signal, everyone… three, two, one, and go go go!”

“Watch out, there’s something coming…”

“Keep an eye out… shit, duck!”

“Just a minute, I’m almos-”

“Wait, no, wait-”

_“Look out!”_

_“Incomi-”_


	10. Day 10: censored

“It’s partially censored, but we can get the gist from it,” I heard someone say, breathless and excited, and I shook myself alert, rubbing my eyes. I glanced at my watch. Damn. No time to get coffee. The meeting would be starting any minute. I yawned and stretched, back cracking in protest. The terrible chairs weren’t comfy to sit in, never mind to _sleep_ in, and my muscles would no doubt be complaining for hours.

The room was filling with people, sitting around the table and lining the walls. There were always more people than chairs, and I vaguely envied the people who were standing. The chairs were old and mismatched and there were maybe two out of the thirty-odd that were comfy. I sat more upright. It didn’t help.

The general bubble of muted conversation around me quieted as T walked in, tall and lithe and terrifying as always, with her black clothes and her knives and her sharp smile. “Hello,” she said, striding towards the table and sitting down at her customary place. I was certain that _her_ chair was comfortable.

“There’s been a development,” she said quietly, and the air around me tensed. There’d been nothing new for quite some time, and everyone had been on edge. In this field, no news was usually bad news.  

“We intercepted a transmission,” she said, laying her hands flat on the table in front of her. “Some of it was blacked out, some of it was mangled, but we’ve managed to piece together a coherent missive.” She looked directly at me and I drew in a juddering breath. “We think we know where they’re being kept.”

The room burst into noise, but I couldn’t move, breath fast and mind reeling and thoughts swirling. _Where they’re being kept._ Finally. _Finally._

I didn’t notice that I was moving until I was standing up, my chair falling to the ground behind me with a clatter that silenced the room. I was aware of everyone staring at me, but I was only looking at T. “Let me go,” I said desperately. “Let me go on the mission.”

T looked at me, her eyes unreadable. Another leader would have denied me- would have looked at me, a slim girl who was tough and strong and an okay shot but nothing _special_ and said no, not for this mission, it’s too important- but T knew me. T had been there when the news had first came in. _Gamma group’s been captured,_ was all it had said, but with that simple sentence my world had shattered. Gamma group had been _her_ group.

“Yes,” T said, breaking the silence. “You can go on the mission.” And then she turned back to address the rest of the room, delegating tasks and giving orders, and I excused myself from the room, sinking to the floor in the corridor outside and drawing in a deep, shuddering breath. I rested my head on my knees, unable to stop my tears.

Finally. Finally, we were going to save them. I was going to save _her._


	11. Day 11: thorn

A bouquet of roses was waiting for her when she got home, exhausted from work and just wanting a cup of tea and a nap. Twenty four beautiful roses, red and white and pink, arranged artfully in a red vase, strange against the old warped wood of her battered kitchen table.  The evening was getting dark, and she flipped the light on, absently flipping the switch on the kettle, her attention drawn again and again to the roses.

Roses were not her favourite flower. She wasn’t that fond of roses, found them cliché and pretentious and overtly fancy, preferred tulips, but she couldn’t deny that these were lovely. She walked over to the table, dumping her keys on the work surface. She stooped to smell the roses and smiled despite herself. They smelled wonderful, like a summer’s day. She reached out, stroking the soft petals, and then gasped in pain, jerking her hand back.

A droplet of blood fell from her pricked finger. She must have caught it on a thorn, she thought, but her brain was suddenly fuzzy, and her limbs felt numb, and she was falling, crumpling onto the ground, her hand banging painfully against the edge of the table as she tried and failed to catch her balance.

And as she lay there on the ground, vision darkening, a thought suddenly struck her, too late. How had the roses got into her house? She tried to lift her head, but her whole body felt weak, and she couldn’t stop her eyes from closing. _Who had gotten into her house?_

She heard the kettle start to boil.


	12. Day 12: obsidian

The night was still, and so was she, standing stationary in amongst the trees, her dull clothes rendering her almost invisible, just another shadow. She’d been there for six hours, and could comfortably stay for six more, in a hyperaware state of tension and control.

It was a cold, crisp night, hinting at snow, but there were no clouds in the sky, and a half moon hung ominously in the obsidian blanket of the sky, stars speckled like drops of silver. It was beautiful, but she wasn’t looking up. Her eyes were fixed steadily on the road in front of the copse of trees. She was waiting.

And then, suddenly, movement, disrupting the silence of the night. She tensed almost imperceptibly, and her gaze became, if possible, even more focused. A man ran out from the bushes on the opposite side of the road, breath coming in short sharp gasps, movements panicky. He paused on the road, glancing behind him…

And she moved, for the first time in hours, and she drew her knife from her belt and threw it in one smooth motion. It was over in seconds. She stepped out from the cover of the trees and pulled her knife back from the lifeless body before her. The blood on the blade was a dark as the sky above her. She wiped it on the corpse’s clothes, and then melted into the trees once more. And she was gone.


	13. Day 13: foresight, exposure

“Listen, it’s not that I don’t love nature, or trees, or walking. It’s just that it’s fucking freezing and I really don’t want to die of _fucking exposure_ or frostbite or whatever people bloody die from, these days, when their girlfriend _drags_ them into the middle of nowhere in the _middle of winter!_ ”

“You’re exaggerating massively on so many points there, I don’t even know where to _start._ ”

“You could start by giving me your jumper?”

“Don’t even. It’s not that cold and besides, you’re the one who didn’t have the foresight to bring a jacket or anything, if you thought you were going to get _frostbite_.”

“Don’t be so snarky, honestly, it’s very endearing and it makes it hard for me to be angry at you.”

“Do you want me to walk several paces in front of you so you can take a fake candid photo?”

“Hard but not _impossible_ , that is. I’m angry. And cold. And we’ve been walking for ages, where are you actually trying to g- wait, don’t sit down, the ground is wet and _cold_ and you’ll catch pneumonia- no, kneeling isn’t better… _oh…”_

“I had a whole speech planned for this but you’re right, it is cold and really, there’s not that much to say, except that you make me happier than anyone ever has, and I just want to spend the rest of my life with you, and fuck I really had meant to make it more romantic and I swear I’ll make it up to you but I’m gonna cry if I keep going so I’m just gonna go ahead and ask. Will you marry me?”

“Oh you fucking idiot, of _course_ I will, yes yes yes yes yes!”

“The ring was my gran’s, my mum gave me her blessing but also asked if I was gonna wait til the leap year to propose so I had to tell her that women can propose any day and it’s an outdated tradition anyway and-”

“Oh, stop blathering and stand up so I can kiss you, I’m still cold and I refuse to kneel down on those _leaves_ …”

“So romantic-”

“Shut up-”

“Make me-”

“…I love you.”

“…”

“…”

“Yeah, that’ll work.”


	14. Day 14: rebel

Sam swore under his breath as he ran, gasping for breath, cursing his lack of fitness and his ridiculous, runaway dog. So much for a relaxing walk along the river. “Hugo! Come back!” But he knew it was hopeless. His dog had ran off, no doubt in search of an intriguing new smell, and Sam was getting his workout for the whole entire _week._ He was very much regretting wearing his new jumper, even if it was pretty and pastel pink and cliché. He liked fitting clichés, sometimes.

He saw Hugo in the distance, and picked up the pace. “Hugo! Bad dog!” he shouted, and crashed into someone, tipping over, thrown terribly off balance. The ground looked hard and unforgiving and he noticed distantly that there was a puddle  _right there,_ of  _course_ but his fall was stopped with a jerk, and he found himself caught by strong arms. He reached out to steady himself, instinctively grabbing at the fabric in front him, and then came to his senses with an astonishing jolt. Here he was, panting and sweaty and clutched like a character swooning in a romance novel to the chest of the most beautiful man he’d ever seen.

“Umm,” he said articulately, and the man smiled, teeth startling white in his dark face.

“You okay?” the man said, and Sam nodded, not trusting himself enough to speak. He untangled himself from the man, sure he was blushing ridiculously, and then looked around for Hugo in a frantic bid to distract himself from the chiselled mountain of a man who’d rescued him. The dog came pounding over to him, yapping and gambolling around him, and Sam smiled despite himself. “Bad Hugo,” he said, but the dog looked happy and free and his heart wasn’t in it.

“Sorry,” Sam said, looking at the man, who thankfully looked amused and not angry. “He likes the river, it brings out his rebellious side, and he always manages to escape.”

The man laughed. “Morag’s the same,” he said, pointing to a rambunctious and rather large golden retriever who came rocketing towards them, barking happily. Sam grinned, reaching down and extending a hand towards the dog. She licked him enthusiastically, and then scampered off to meet Hugo.

“Your dog has a human name,” said Sam stupidly, and the man laughed again. It was an unfairly beautiful sound.

“Yeah, and so does yours,” he said, smiling. “I’m Kevin,” he added, reaching out a hand to Sam.

“I’m Sam,” Sam said, feeling his face, if that was even possible, become even redder.

“Nice to meet you,” Kevin said, not letting go of Sam’s hand. “I like your jumper.”

Sam laughed disbelievingly. “I like to be a cliché,” he said, and to his surprise and delight, Kevin chuckled, a grin spreading across his face. He made a mental note to get Hugo some extra treats later. Damn dog was a bloody genius.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this one for my friend Ewan, who also likes pink jumpers and cute dogs and beautiful boys. Kevin is fully based on Trevante Rhodes, who is absolutely gorgeous, because we'd just seen Moonlight that day (it was the most amazing film, I cried.)


	15. Day 15: decisions

Violet didn’t like fire. After all the fires she’d seen, all the destruction she’d witnessed, all the terrible things she’d had to do, to protect herself, to protect those she loved… The lines between good and evil had been blurred for god knows how long, and she was no longer quite sure where she stood. If bad deeds are done by good people who are trying to do good, does that make the deeds less bad or the people less good?

Violet didn’t know.

But she knew that fire was right at the heart of it. Fire had ripped apart her family, killed her parents. Fire had killed her friends, destroyed her home and the homes of so many others, decimated communities, turned safe places into a pile of ashes.

She’d tried to rebuild her life. But the smell of smoke still made her twitch, made her heart beat faster, made her palms sweat and her pulse quicken. She wasn’t scared of much, anymore, but she couldn’t have candles in her house, couldn’t go near bonfires. Even fireplaces, where fire was contained and controlled, were sources of terror for her.

She’d banished a lot of demons. But the flicker of a flame reminded her of all the devastation she’d seen, and that...

Well. She didn’t think that would ever go away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is fully inspired by A Series of Unfortunate Events- I'd just finished a reread when I wrote this!


	16. Day 16: alone, journey

No-one tells you what happens when you die. Religions have their ideas, but how could they know? Guesses, hypotheses, theories… The leaps of terrified minds. People imagine a hell or a heaven or something in between, but what happens is this:

Your body dies. Your eyes close. Your consciousness leaves your body. And you _die._

And then you wake up. You wake up alone in a vast desert, with nothing but sand as far as the eye can see. If you were to stoop, to touch the ground, run your hands through the sand, you would feel a coldness, more like snow than sand. But people rarely do. What happens is this:

You walk. You walk through the desert, under the endless starless cloudless night. How long you walk depends on your life, on your thoughts, on what you’ve done with your time alive. Some people walk for years. Some people walk forever.

And then, if you’re lucky, you’ll reach the end of your desert. And then what happens is this:


	17. Day 17: life

The monster first came when Steph was six, hiding under her bed and growling. It was only there at night, and Steph never saw it, and even though the noises were scary, Steph somehow knew it wouldn’t hurt her.

“What is your name?” she asked the monster one night, leaning down and whispering. The monster didn’t answer.

But still she asked, every night, until one night the monster did answer. “I don’t have a name,” it hissed, and Steph frowned.

“How can you not have a name?” she asked, confused, but the monster didn’t answer. “We’ll have to find you a name,” Steph said decidedly. “Are you a girl?”

“Yes,” came the voice, and Steph smiled.

“Good,” she said forcefully. “Boys are stupid.”

By the time Steph was ten, the monster was the closest friend she had, but she still hadn’t found a name. She’d looked in all the books she could read, but although she wrote them all down and read them to the monster, none of them were right.

But still, they talked, and Steph read to the monster from her books, and her parents thought she was talking to herself.

“What is _life?”_ the monster asked, her voice raspy and hoarse from under the bed.

Steph thought about it for a minute before answering. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know the definition. But I can look it up in the big dictionary in the morning, and tell you tomorrow night?”

She came back the next night with the definition written down on a scrap of paper. “There were two definitions,” she said, curled up on her bed, quilt wrapped around her. “1. The condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death.” The monster made a strange noise, and Steph laughed. “I had to look up some of those words too,” she said, “I can explain it?” And she did, and the monster was quiet.

“The second definition was shorter,” Steph said, squinting at the paper. “2. The existence of an individual human being or animal.”

The monster didn’t speak for quite some time.

“Have you gone to sleep?” Steph whispered.

“No,” the monster said, but her voice was barely there.

“Are you okay?” asked Steph.

“Do you think I have life?” asked the monster.

Steph thought about it. “Yes,” she said finally, “of course. You exist, don’t you? So you’re alive. And you have life.”

The monster didn’t say anything, but as Steph drifted off into sleep, she thought that the sounds the monster was making seemed much happier than usual.

When Steph was fourteen, she knew that not everyone had a monster under the bed. She didn’t care. The monster was still her best friend. And she still hadn’t found the right name.

When Steph was fifteen, her school friends were talking about boys. Steph didn’t understand the fascination. Neither did the monster. They talked about the stars and the planets and life and animals.

When Steph was sixteen, she went to a sleepover at her friend’s house. She was given their spare bed, and without the noises under her bed, she didn’t get a wink of sleep.

When Steph was seventeen, she got accepted into university, a university far across the country. That night, she went to bed early. Her monster was there.

“Monster?” she asked tentatively. She still hadn’t found the right name.

“Yes?”

“I’m going to uni,” Steph said. “I’m moving away.”

The monster was silent.

“Will you come with me?” Steph asked.

“If you find my name,” said the monster, but she sounded sad.

“I will,” Steph promised, but she didn’t think the monster believed her.

The summer before Steph left for university, she turned eighteen. And that night, she dreamed of her monster, sitting on the bed beside her, and she turned and put her mouth near Sophie’s ear, and whispered a name.

“Freya,” Steph gasped, waking with a jolt, and the monster said it with her, joy in her voice. _“Freya.”_

The next day, Steph woke up, and instead of a monster under her bed, there was a girl standing beside the bed. A _human_ girl.

_Freya._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't realise until way after I'd written this that it is fully plagarised from [lady_ragnell](https://archiveofourown.org/works/906869). Read hers instead, it's much better...


	18. Day 18: anachronistic

**Extract from “The Study of Witches” by Stephen Cabrano:**

Magic tends to skip a generation. Often, witches learn from their grandmothers, and so they always have a slightly old-fashioned approach to things. Heavy spellbooks filled with crammed handwritten spells and recipes, old cauldrons and knives… Not to mention that specialised tools such as broomsticks and wands are remarkably expensive- hard to make, so there are few who do.  It’s rare that your average village witch will have a new one. More likely she’ll have a broom that’s been handed down from at least four witches before her, that’s been mended and patched so often that there’s very little of the original broom left.

But the witches themselves tend to be _modern,_ and it makes for an entertaining and remarkable system. Young witches are filled with thoughts about progress and new ideas and a fresh outlook on everything. They work closely with the people and they learn what they want. Witches are almost always empathetic, caring, concerned about the people in their village, the people under their _care_. They talk with the people and they hear their ideas and then they try and implement them.

Because of this, witches’ homes are always so anachronistic, I’ve noticed. Old books stacked beside laptops, cauldrons beside electric kettles, and once I even saw a brand-new modern motorbike in a garage beside an old broom with half of its twigs bent all over the place. It truly is an interesting juxtaposition.

**Note scrawled at the bottom of the page in pencil:**

_What absolute fucking bollocks. What a wanker. If I’d known he was going to write this drivel I’d never have let him in my bloody house. What did he do, go to three witches’ houses and decide he was an expert? Just another man with unwanted opinions. Well he can take his bloody ‘study of witches’ and shove it up his own arse. And I’ll remember this is he ever needs help from an ‘anachronistic witch’. Pompous prick._


	19. Day 19: bookshop

It felt just like one of those old bookshops, with the stacks of books and the old chairs and the piles of maps and the hidden corners. People would go to it, explore through shelves of ancient books, laugh at the doors that were blatantly too small for even the shortest human, and occasionally buy a book from the bored teenager at the desk, who had school work open on the desk in front of her and an apparent lack of interest in anyone or anything that happened.

But if you knew which shelf to go to, which book to open, which words to say, then another door would open, and you could go through to another shop. One that couldn’t be more different. One that was instantly, obviously magical.

Bundles of herbs hanging from the ceiling, tied with colourful string. Rows and rows of different coloured glass jars, containing everything from dried flies to human toenails to vampire blood. Sacks of lentils, beans, soil, gravel, sands from the furthest deserts and snow from the coldest tundras. There was a whole clothing section, with hats and cloaks and flame-proof gloves and water-proof boots and thermal underwear. There were racks of broomsticks, from the cheapest model to the racing class. There were crystal balls and cauldrons and amulets and spell books and quills and parchment and knives (for potion making or for self-defence). There was a wall with hundreds of tiny bits of paper, offering casting lessons or needing a special rare herb or asking if anyone had seen a missing cat or informing everyone of a group meeting to knit.

The air smelled of smoke and rum and strange herbs and incense. To me, it always felt like coming home.


	20. Day 20: odious

_People are sitting next to me in this train._

Matt blinked at the text, and then typed out a tentative reply.

**_i mean  
_ ** **_that's usually how it goes on trains_ **

The quickness of Sarah’s reply suggested she wasn't reading, wasn't writing, wasn't doing her normal train activities.

 _Yes.  
_ _But there's lots of them.  
_ _They're so noisy.  
_ _And there is an odious smell._  

Mark chuckled.

 ** _odious?  
_** ** _you're such a fucking pretentious writer_**  

Sarah’s reply was a middle finger emoji, and Mark grinned.

**_it’s not a long journey tho, you'll be fine_ **

_WILL I????_

**_stop overreacting_ **

_I am NOT overreacting._

**_if you say so_ **

_Alright fine maybe I am.  
_ _But they're drinking beer and being loud.  
_ _I'm going to deafen myself with how high my music is turned up, honestly._  

 ** _you’ll be fine  
_** ** _anyway  
_** ** _i’m going into my meeting now  
_** **** _thanks for entertaining me_  

_No don't leave me!_

**_have fun!_ **

Mark turned off his phone with a smile, feeling much better about his shitty meeting. At least he wasn't on a train.

 


	21. Day 21: full moon

“It is absolutely fucking freezing,” Em muttered, gazing up at the stars and the full moon in the dark night sky, and scowled as she heard a laugh through her earpiece.  “Don’t laugh!”

 _“Come on, I’m allowed to laugh,”_ Lucy said, and Em could hear how amused she was.

“It’s alright for you, I’m sure you’re nice and warm in your cosy car with the heater on,” Em said, rubbing her hands together. They felt like little blocks of ice.

 _“Yeah, I am,”_ Lucy said smugly, _“I bet you’re upset that the random final race was Rainbow Road now, huh?”_

“It’s not fair that you’re so much better at that one!” Em snapped, and Lucy laughed again. “I’m gonna win next time, and then you’ll have to stand out in the cold to watch the building.”

 _“Yeah, right,”_ Lucy said, _“is that a promise?”_

“Yes,” Em said vehemently, and then straightened as she saw movement. “Ooh, heads up, there he is.”

 _“I’m on my way,”_ Lucy said, and Em heard the door open. _“The one who arrests him choses dinner tonight?”_

“You’re on,” Em said, and started to run.


	22. Day 22: non-binary, pride

_“Bisexuality isn’t real! It’s just a word for people who are confused. You’re either gay or straight, and you’ll grow out of this and pick one.”_

It’s a sunny day and I’m in a crowd of people, marching along. I can see boys holding hands, girls kissing, a tiny kid beaming from ear to ear with a t-shirt proudly proclaiming ‘I love my two mummies!’ and waving a mini rainbow flag in one pudgy hand. I’m wearing my bisexual flag t-shirt and my eyeshadow is the colours of the flag and around me it’s a riot of bright colours and happy faces and joyous noise. I smile.

_“You can’t use ‘they’ to refer to one singular person, it’s not grammatically correct! There’s no such thing as ‘non-binary’, everyone’s either male or female.”_

I turn to my friend and they grin at me. There’s a trans flag badge pinned to their t-shirt, which has ‘they/them’ painted on it in neon orange, and they’re eating an ice cream cone. The ice cream drips onto their wrist and they laugh as they try and fail to lick it before it melts. They’re relaxed and at ease and it’s lovely to see.

_“What’s the point in gay marriage? I mean, you can just have a civil partnership, that’s the same, stop complaining!”_

There’s two old men walking along, a stream of people going faster around them, the two of them content to go their own pace. They’re holding hands, wedding rings glinting on their fingers. Their hair is grey and their faces are wrinkled and they’re wearing matching t-shirts that say ‘together for thirty years, married for one!’, and they’re gazing around them with faces full of emotion, as if they’re astonished at how far we’ve come. They look so _happy_ , and I can’t stop my tears.

_“Don’t be ridiculous, this is just a phase. You’ll get over it and find a nice boy and settle down.”_

It’s later that day, and I’m sitting on the beach, watching the sunset with my girlfriend. Today’s makeup is smudged across her face, glitter everywhere, a giant rainbow flag tied around her shoulders. She’s beautiful in the fading light, and I love her so much that my heart is full of it, and I’m so incredibly lucky that she loves me too. And as she kisses me and the sky changes colour, all I can think is how much things change. Things change and people change and you should never stop hoping, and wishing, and loving. And you should always have pride.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the 22nd of February, our creative writing workshop was an LGBT+ workshop, so the prompts were LGBT+ based. I cried while writing this.


	23. Day 23: door

“Will you please stop slamming the bloody door? One day it’s gonna crack or break or something and then I’ll get the blame for it, since you’re not supposed to even be here.” She was sprawled on her bed, glaring at me.

I opened the door again, and then closed it slowly and carefully, exaggerating my movements. She threw a pillow at me, and I laughed, dropping my bag to the floor and stooping to pick up the pillow and fling it back at her. She batted it away easily, but her glare had dropped from her face, and she smiled at me.

I grinned back, just standing there, taking it in. This was the only place I felt at home. It smelled of sweet candles and bath bombs and chocolate, and I could hear the sea just outside the window, and feel the cool breeze on my skin. I felt more at home here than I did at my own home, here with the girl that I loved. And speaking of…

I collapsed on the bed next to her, and she wrapped her arms around me without speaking, just holding me as I relaxed, tension melting away. I buried my face in her neck, inhaling her scent, feeling her soft skin against mine. “I love you,” I whispered, my words almost lost, but her grip tightened around me. She always heard.

“I love you too,” she murmured, and I closed my eyes and smiled.


	24. Day 24: iridescent

There was a mermaid at the pier. She’d pulled herself partially out of the water, her head resting on her crossed arms on the stone of the low pier, her tail waving lazily back and forth, half out of the water.

I blinked at her. I’d been sitting on the edge of the pier, reading my book, cooling my feet in the water, swinging my legs back and forth, when there’d been a splash of water and then she’d appeared.

“Hello,” I said stupidly, staring at her, my mouth gaping. She was very beautiful.  Her hair was long and dark and wet, falling around her face and down her back. Her tail was a pale pink, iridescent and shiny, contrasting with the dark brown of her skin. Her smile was huge and happy and her eyes were green and I was still staring.

“Hello,” said the mermaid, looking up at me. “How are you?”

“I’m… I’m fine?” I said. A mermaid was talking to me. A beautiful mermaid was talking to me. “How are you?”

“I’m great,” she beamed, and then her face turned sad. “Actually, I was wondering if you could help me with something?”

“Yes, of course,” I said, way too quickly. I could feel my face flushing. Damnit.

“There’s just one thing I need, to get my tail to turn into legs.”

“What is it? I’ll help!” I said, eagerly.

“I need a kiss from a pretty girl.”

“Oh, okay,” I said, looking around, “I’ll just-”

I was interrupted by her laugh, and I glanced back down at her. She was smiling at me, and I realised.

“Oh. You mean me?” I asked, blushing, and she nodded. I smiled faintly, and then bent down to kiss her. Her lips were soft and salty and I was kissing a mermaid and it was lovely.

I pulled away, and looked down at her tail. It was still there. “Oh,” I said, disappointed. “It didn’t work.”

She laughed again. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking a little guilty. “I lied. I don’t need a kiss to make my legs appear, I just need to get fully out of the water.”

“Oh,” I said, and grabbed the hand she reached out, pulling her awkwardly up onto the pier, wishing I was stronger. Finally she was out the water, sitting beside me, as her tail dried in the sun and her legs appeared.

“Wow,” I said, unable to stop myself, and she grinned at me.

“Thank you,” she said gratefully, and I ducked my head, embarrassed.

“Umm,” I said, peeking up at her. She was looking at me. “You don’t need to lie to get me to kiss you,” I said, and she laughed, bringing her lips to mine again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm definitely going to make this one into a fic.


	25. Day 25: candle

“Did you get it?” Her voice was low and greedy, as she leaned over the table, hair perilously close to the flickering candle that was all that illuminated this dark corner in the dingy bar.

“Yes,” I said, smirking. “Of course. Have I ever failed before?”

She raised an eyebrow. “There was that time in the castle, where you-”

“Alright, alright,” I said quickly, hoping that she wouldn’t see my blush in the dim room. “In my defence, that wasn’t entirely my fault…”

She scoffed. “Wasn’t that the time you fucked the prince and his girlfriend?”

“You don’t have to be so crude about it,” I said, but I couldn’t help my grin. I might have screwed up the mission but it had certainly been a great night.

“Enough of this,” she said, losing patience, “show me it!”

I laughed. “So possessive, honestly,” I chided, but I was already delving into my bag, pulling out the parcel, wrapped in coarse brown fabric, tied with string. She reached for it, hands grabby and urgent, and I pulled it back out of her reach.

“Can I have my payment first, please?” I said mildly, and she glared at me.

“Don’t you trust me?” she snapped, looking hurt, and I smiled at her.

“I’d trust you with my life,” I said, “but I don’t trust you to not just run away without paying me.”

She sighed and then nodded. “Fair,” she muttered grudgingly, and produced a small cloth bag- I didn’t see where from. It jingled when I picked it up, and I pulled at the drawstring, glancing inside. The silver coins glinted, and I nodded, satisfied, and slipped the pouch into my pocket. I didn’t bother counting it- I knew that the exact amount would be there.

I pushed the cloth-wrapped package across the sticky table and she snatched it up, cradling it in her hands. She carefully unwrapped a corner, peeking in. She knew better than to take it out in a place like this. The jewels caught the light, sparkling brightly, and she covered them up again, and slid the package into her bag.

“Thank you,” she said, and I smiled.

“It’s my job,” I said, and she laughed, nodding.

“Yeah, but you do it better than anyone else,” she said, and I ducked my head, unable to conceal how much the small praise meant to me.

She cleared her throat, and I looked at her. She was slouching back in her seat, looking more relaxed now that the ‘official’ part was done. “Speaking of jobs,” she said, “I have one to offer you.”

I perked up, vaguely interested. “Do tell,” I urged, and she chuckled.

“And you say I have no patience,” she said, and I stuck my tongue out at her. “Anyway, this job, it’s a long one, it’ll need a long period of infiltration. We’re hoping to use two women, it’ll be easier to get them into the place, and I was wondering if you wanted to do it with me?”

“Huh,” I said, surprised. I’d never worked personally with her before- I hadn’t known that she even did the hands-on work herself. But I couldn’t deny that the idea held its appeal. “I’m in,” I said, and it was her turn to look surprised.

“Without any more info?”

“Yep,” I said, standing up and slinging my bag over my shoulder. “If you’re involved, I know it will be fun.”

She beamed. It lit up her face. “I’ll get the details to you,” she said, lifting her drink in farewell.

“I look forward to it.” And as I walked away, I realised that I genuinely was. This could turn out to be an interesting job.

 


	26. Day 26: oranges

I didn’t realise it at the time, didn’t realise the significance. I just looked at the golden brown, slightly misshapen pancake on the flowery plate in front of me, butter melting on it, sugar dissolving, and smiled at her, picking up my fork and digging in.

Tommy told me later. “Pancakes are like. Her _thing._ ”

I frowned. “Excuse me?”

“You know, her thing.” He was chopping peppers, red and green and yellow, sharp knife a blur of motion. He was never still, was Tommy. “She didn’t make pancakes just for anyone. I know they’re ridiculously easy to make, but she says she can never be bothered going to all that effort. She only makes them for people she cares about. Was it the morning after?”

I gaped at him, sure my cheeks were bright red. “What… I… I mean…”

He laughed. “Come on, Cat, don’t be coy, just tell me.”

“Yeah, okay,” I muttered, not meeting his eye. “I stayed at hers the night before.”

He practically crowed with laughter, and I looked up to glare at him. “Stayed at hers? You mean you _slept together._ You _fucked._ You-”

“Okay okay,” I said hastily, before he could get any cruder. “For an ace person, you’re very explicit.”

He grinned. “What can I say?” he said, brandishing the knife and shrugging. “I love to subvert expectations.”

I smiled despite myself. “Anyway, yes, she made me pancakes,” and I could feel the heat rising to my cheeks. “But I didn’t realise the significance. I didn’t realise…” I could hear the unspoken in his words. I knew what she’d been through. I knew what this meant.

Tommy frowned at me. “What are you gonna do now you know?”

It would have to be something good. The pancakes had been delicious, but more than that. Her soft smile across the table, the orange juice in the blue cup by my plate- so sharp and sweet and lovely, her hand brushing mine as she slid another pancake onto my plate… I may have loved her before that, but that morning was the moment I truly realised that I’d be happy to spend my life with this girl.

And I played the piano for her, and she brought her hands to her mouth and I knew that she knew, that she _knew_ what this meant, and I was shaky from emotion and clumsy from lack of practice and she sat next to me on the seat, tears in her eyes, and she kissed me soft and sweet, and I smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And on this one my flatmate wrote "ARE THEY SPIDERS TELL ME", because they think they're funny.


	27. Day 27: negligible

Everything is dark. I wonder if my eyes are closed. I don’t think it would matter. I’m in a steel box, and I can feel the cold metal against my bare shoulders, my bare arms. If I stretch my toes, I can feel the base of the box, but I don’t. I try not to think about the small size of the box, try not to think about how much it feels like a coffin.

And I try not to think about what I overheard, the doctors in their lab coats and me on the bed. They’d not even been trying to whisper. They thought I was asleep.

 _How many have died?_ the woman had asked, offhand. There had been a rustle of paper, as if the other doctor was checking.

 _Seventy,_ he’d said, and he’d sounded pleased. _Only seventy._

 _What’s the percentage?_  the woman asked, and there was more rustling.

_0.005% failure._

_Wow,_ the woman had said, and she had sounded impressed. _That’s almost negligible._

And now I’m trying not to think about it. Hoping that I’ll be okay. Hoping that I won’t become a failed statistic, an error. Hoping I won’t be negligible. Hoping I’ll survive.


	28. Day 28: mirrored

We were on the underground, exhausted and drained and grumpy and not holding hands. The carriage was full, and we were standing, and she was standing slightly away from me. We weren't touching, and although neither of us had said, I knew why.

Because this morning we'd been holding hands walking down the street, minding our own business, and an old woman had shouted at us.

 _You’re the reason the world is a mess!_ she’d yelled, and worse things too, and we'd dropped hands like the other was on fire, too afraid to shout back at her.

And here we were, on an underground, and there was a distance between us that hadn't been there before.

The train shuddered to a halt and I swayed with the motion, shifting out of the way for the people coming on. I was tired and upset and I wanted to be home, wanted to be safe in our flat where I could hug her and we could sleep in each other's arms.

But then, music started, and I jumped, glancing around. Further down the carriage, a group of men were standing, dancing, one with an accordion and one with a drum and one with a trumpet, and they were playing, but more than that they were having _fun_. Dancing and scatting and grinning, playing the most joyous song that filled the carriage with noise and music.

I looked over at her. Her foot was tapping and her lips were curving into a tentative smile, and she met my eyes, hers so bright and blue and beautiful, and the emotions I saw there mirrored my own. And I reached out my hand and she took it, and then we were dancing, dancing terribly and ungracefully and uncoordinated in this cramped underground train. She spun me and I laughed, and someone cheered, and she grinned, wide and uncontrolled, and the music continued and we smiled.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is based off of something that actually happened to me- I was on the underground in London and a band got on an started playing, and these two girls were dancing and having a great time. I think they were just friends, but you know. Make everything gay.  
> And this is the last one! I hope you enjoyed reading them as much as I enjoyed writing them!

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/holIyshort) \- come and say hi!


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